BEAUMONT, Texas — Attorney Michael Getz was cited and escorted from a Beaumont School Board meeting Thursday night for reading aloud the names of district employees, a violation of the district's policy on public comments, according to an observer.

Getz, best known for suing the district to stop the demolition of South Park Middle School, was reading an opinion piece published in the weekly Examiner during the public comment section of the meeting, said Mike Neil, co-chairman of the BETTER group.

BETTER - Beaumonters Embracing Transition Towards Election Reform - wants to change how the school board is selected. Getz is an active member of BETTER.

Getz was warned as he mentioned district employees by name that this violated the district's policy, Neil said.

Getz, who often speaks at the meetings, responded that he had a First Amendment right to read the names, Neil said. Getz ultimately was cited by district police and escorted from the meeting, Neil said.

The school district has issued a statement that Getz purposely caused the disruption at the meeting in order to garner attention for the BETTER group's petition drive.

The group needs to get signatures from 15 percent of the registered voters in order to have their issue put on the May ballot. They have until Oct. 14 to get 9,400 signatures and have said they only need 600 more.

Board president Woodrow Reece said he is saddened to see that anyone would violate the order of the law after repeatedly being requested and warned, according to the district.

"We have managed to conduct our meetings in an orderly and respectful fashion. We will not allow such continued violations and disrespect to occur," Reece explained.

Getz was removed from the board room and charged with disrupting a public meeting.